


By Degrees

by Measured



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Falling In Love, M/M, Present Tense, Radio, Slow Build, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-24
Updated: 2013-09-24
Packaged: 2017-12-27 12:00:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/978604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Measured/pseuds/Measured
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stepping into Night Vale is like going down the rabbit hole. Except, this is no dream, and Wonderland actually makes sense.</p>
            </blockquote>





	By Degrees

**Author's Note:**

  * For [languisity (schismism)](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=languisity+%28schismism%29).



> [this](http://yourunderwaterskies.tumblr.com/post/59007165205/ishida-goes54667752-starry-night-umbrella) is the umbrella. The Cecil quotes are intentionally wrong as they're different broadcasts than canon.

Stepping into Night Vale is like going down the rabbit hole. Except, this is no dream, and Wonderland actually makes sense. A dream of rabbits and cats and children that turn into pigs, something beyond the mirror and woken from.

He keeps his books close to his chest. A shield, a wall. No secret police have come to his doorstep, despite the ban. Is it his status as an outsider, or Cecil himself?

Every night in the dark of his room, through figures and fact, a voice over the radio joins him.

_Remember, listeners. Do not look at librarians. Do not look for trees, for that will waste precious time, unless it is a Wednesday, or the Whispering forest has expanded. I repeat, do not look the librarians in the eyes—_

He remembers women with curly gray hair, like a brillo pad. Colored glasses on a lanyard, bright floral dresses. Are these the beasts Cecil warns about?

Of course it would be different here. Everything is.

Especially him.

*

He's never been good at relationships. He's too distant, too logical, and too lost in his work. If he could pull apart his heart and fix the gears, clockwork, he would.

But clocks don't work in Night Vale. He's pulled them apart time by time, unable to find that local attraction which Cecil claims is invisible. 

His hand lingers over the phone as Cecil talks about a floating cat. He draws away, as if burned. He goes back to his work as the sound of the weather comes across the room, a sweet, sad song. The words make no sense, but nothing does anymore. 

He puts another slide under the microscope. A little cross-section of a leaf. Under the microscope, it looks more like abstract art than any plant biology he is used to. Even the plants are strange, here. 

How fascinating, how fascinating.

Through the room, Cecil's voice joins him, comforts him.

_Good night, Night Vale. Good night._

He's recorded the radio broadcast before. Spliced together words, listened to them again to understand the complexities of Night Vale. Once, an error gave him a sound fragment of _Good Night, Carlos._

He keeps it, hidden among all his nonsensical data. Flying cats and glow clouds, and a dark-eyed stranger who loves him. Sometimes when he can't sleep, he plays it over and over. Cecil says his name like a love song. He says his names in way he cannot quantify, cannot escape with metal and clockwork, or his own distance.

When he calls the station, he talks in facts, because that is all he knows.

*

The gift arrives carried by a mute child, who disappears, ghostlike before he can thank them.  
Purple and black with a pattern of stars un the underside, large, it's large enough to fit two.  
Facts come and go through his mind, binary numbers. _Did you know that umbrellas date back to even ancient Persian times? Did you know that in Japan, two people under the umbrella signifies a relationship?_

He opens up his extra large umbrella, courtesy of the local radio station for winning the prize of _having the most beautiful hair in the entire town, and being a local treasure._

Cecil's handwriting is a messy cursive. Ink spots mar the paper. A ballpoint shouldn't make this kind of mess–does he use a quill. With a quick glance to the side to make sure no assistant are near, he brings the paper a little closer to study it.

It smells of patchouli and sandalwood, like mystery and desire.

Out on the town, a giant glow cloud floats over the town. It rains cats and dogs in a most literal fashion.

More often than not, he can't even see the stars, as if they were swallowed up in a tar black sky. The word on the street is Night Vale believes this is the cause of _angering the old gods_ and that they must be appeased by _sacrifices in the bloodstone circles._

Sometimes he feels like the entire town is a giant joke he isn't let in on. The longer he's here, the more he questions this hypothesis. 

He looks up at the stars Cecil has given him. The big dipper, Cassiopeia, Cygnus. Wishing on stars comes from the Roman goddess Venus. Cecil is the only other person he's found to know that. 

Of course, his is historical and Cecil's knowledge is to _remind us to appease the old gods_ , but it's a connection, nonetheless. Through the point of all this twisted, fascinating world of Night Vale, Cecil is beginning to be the one solidity. His sense of the rational is slipping as every day, new common happenings of Night Vale disrupt everything he has ever believed.

Through all this, he can see a patch of fake stars on the underside of an umbrella, guiding him onwards. Yet again, without even realizing it has gone this far, Cecil has become his compass and north star.


End file.
